Letter to Vacaville couple: ‘Your interracial family is not welcome here’

The Yu family, of Vacaville, got an anonymous letter Wednesday telling them they were not welcome in the neighborhood.

Photo: Handout / Marc Yu

An anonymous letter sent to a Vacaville family urged them to find someplace else to live because the condition of their front yard was supposedly dragging down the “higher standards” of the “older neighborhood with established residents.”

“This is not the ghetto,” the letter said. “We may sound harsh, but your interracial family is not welcome here. We will contact your landlord and tell them to evict you if you don’t vacate in the next 60 days.”

Marc Yu found the letter sticking out of his mailbox on his way to work Wednesday morning.

The 43-year-old San Francisco native said he was surprised at first, then upset and eventually eager to see the letter-writer contact the family’s landlord: Yu owns the home.

“It’s a stupid letter,” he said.

Yu posted a picture of the letter on Facebook shortly after finding it.

“It’s 2019,” he wrote. “I can’t believe this ... still happens.”

Almost immediately, he received an outpouring of support online and in person, although a few commenters accused him of making up the whole thing. Neighbors knocked on the family’s door and told Yu, who is of Chinese and Filipino descent, and his wife, Sandy, who’s from Mexico, that they are welcome in the neighborhood.

Vacaville police Lt. Mark Donaldson said the letter was “disturbing and disappointing and not representative of the community,” but it’s probably not a criminal violation.

It wasn’t the first time the couple, who have five children, ages 2 to 12, got a message in the mail about the state of their lawn.

About two months ago, Yu said, he got another letter — one that “wasn’t so condescending” — telling the family to clear their front yard or else they would be reported to city officials. At some point, a code inspector showed up and the family cleaned up the items: a shelf, a small plastic shed and a new baby stroller.

The Yus moved into the house in November. The prior owners hadn’t maintained the lawn and it was mostly weeds, Yu said. He’s been trying to improve the yard, but between his job running a mortgage company branch and Sandy’s work taking care of the kids, the process has been slow.

After all the attention on social media and elsewhere, Yu said, he thinks the anonymous pen pal got the message “to not harass us anymore and just leave us alone.”

Kimberly Veklerov is the lead digital reporter for The San Francisco Chronicle. Previously, she covered Oakland City Hall and the East Bay for The Chronicle, reporting on stories ranging from the Ghost Ship fire tragedy to the Oakland police misconduct scandal. She joined The Chronicle in 2015 as a crime and breaking news reporter. Veklerov studied economics at UC Berkeley and served as the editor-in-chief and president of The Daily Californian, the student newspaper.